Shelley, Rick - Dirigent Mercenary Corps 01 - Officer-Cadet

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Rick Shelley - DMC 1 - Officer CadetAce Books by Kick Shelley
UNTIL RELIEVED * SIDE SHOW JUMP PAY
THE BUCHANAN CAMPAIGN
THE FIRES OF COVENTRY
OFFICER-CADET
LIEUTENANT
OFFICER-CADET
RICK SHELLEY
A
ACE BOOKS, NEW YORK
If you purchased this book without a cover, you should be aware that this book
is stolen property. It was reported as "unsold and destroyed** to the publisher,
and neither the author nor the publisher has received any payment for this
"stripped book."
This book is an Ace original edition, and has never been previously published.
OFFICER-CADET
An Ace Book / published by arrangement with the author
PRINTING HISTORY
Ace edition/May 1998
All rights reserved. Copyright © 1998 by Rick Shelley.
Cover art by Duane O. Myers.
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For information address: The Berkley Publishing Group,
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PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
The year is A.D. 2803. The interstellar diaspora from Earth has been in progress
for nearly seven centuries. The numbers are uncertain, but at least five hundred
worlds have been settled, and perhaps well over a thousand. The total human
population of the galaxy could be in excess of a trillion. On Earth, the
Confederation of Human Worlds still theoretically controls all of those
colonies, but the reality is that it can count on its orders being obeyed only
as far as the most distant permanent outpost within Earth's system, on Titan.
Beyond Saturn, there are two primary interstellar political groupings, the
Confederation of Human Worlds (broken away from the organization on Earth with
the same name, with its capital on the world known as Union) and the Second
Commonwealth, centered on Buckingham. Neither of those political unions is as
large or as powerful as they will be in another two centuries, when their
diametrically opposed interests finally bring them to the point of war. In the
meantime, humans who need military assistance, and do not want the domination of
either Confederation or Commonwealth, have only a handful of options. Those who
can afford it turn to mercenaries. And the largest source of those is on the
world of Dirigent…
Prologue
The series of sonic booms came as no surprise. Lieutenant Arlan Taiters scarcely
blinked. Mentally, he counted the snap-roar reports of attack shuttles coming in
hot. Six: Three companies were coming in at once. One lander had come in
earlier, more sedately, with the dead and wounded—too many of each. It was
always too many, but it could have been worse. The Belatrong contract had been
short, if bloodier than anticipated. At least that was the early scuttlebutt on
base. The rumors had started floating through the regiments as soon as the first
messages had arrived from the returning ship when it broke out of Q-space
entering the Dirigent system three days earlier.
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Arlan stared out the lone window of his tiny office. He stood so close to the
window that his shadow made the office seem dark. Through unconscious habit, he
stood at a rigid parade rest—legs slightly spread, hands clasped behind his
back. He found that as comfortable a stance as any. Only his green eyes moved.
He had glanced upward briefly during the thunder of returning attack landers,
even though he had known that he would not be able to see them, then returned to
his casual survey of the regimental area. The shadows outside were starting to
creep onto the parade ground.
The shadows inside the office—Taiters rarely turned on an inside light during
daylight hours—made the room look even starker than it was. Nothing suggested
that Taiters had occupied the office for three years, since he had won his
RICK SHELLEY
commission. There was little to suggest that anyone ever used the room. The
small desk and straight chair had become antiques through the simple expedient
of surviving in place. They had been inexpensive but functional to start with
and had gained no value by virtue of age. They remained serviceable decades
after purchase. The complink was nearly as old. The room held no other
furnishings or decorations. Arlan did not use the office much. It simply gave
him a place to work on the reports that he had to complete each week, a place to
talk to his men privately. And it provided a modest extension to his living
quarters—an adjoining room that was scarcely larger than the office.
When the knock came at the hall door, Arlan pivoted toward it and said, "Enter."
The soldier came in, shut the door behind him, and snapped to attention. He
saluted and said, ' 'Cadet Lon No-lan reporting as ordered, sir."
Arlan straightened up to attention and returned the salute. Although Taiters had
spent most of the day training with his two platoons, his camouflage battledress
appeared fresh. "At ease, Cadet," he said. Both men relaxed—slightly.
"We don't have nearly as much time for this as I would have liked," Taiters
said. "Regimental Honors Parade will be called in ten minutes or less." He
stared at the new apprentice officer, evaluating. Lon Nolan was two inches
taller than the lieutenant but weighed about the same. Nolan looked considerably
younger than the twenty-two years his dossier showed. He looked as if he had not
yet completely matured physically. An illusion, Taiters reminded himself. They
always look too damn young.
"For now, I just want to make absolutely certain that you know your place in the
organization, Cadet. You are not in line of command. You do not outrank anyone.
Bottom of the heap. No man commands other men in the Corps until he has been in
combat himself. It doesn't matter how many fancy military academies he has
almost graduated from, or how long he has worn the uniform of the Dirigent
OFFICER-CADET!
Mercenary Corps." The lieutenant held a small metal de vice up in front of Lon,
a lieutenant's dress uniform insig nia—diamond-shaped, of gold, with a red
enamel diamonc in the center. "These have to be earned. Is that clear?"
"Yes, sir," Lon replied crisply. His eyes did not waver The same message had
been drilled into him over and ovei since his arrival on Dirigent. He thought
that it was a good policy—though it would never have been practical back or
Earth.
"Any questions, Cadet?"
"Just one, sir." For now, Lon thought. "How soon can I expect combat?"
Arlan allowed himself a slow blink. The question was the… anticipated one. "I'm
not on the Council of Regiments, Cadet. I doubt that it will be very long,
though. We've been on the ground quite a while without a paying contract." He
did not elaborate beyond that, about the expectations of the Corps, that the
ideal the Council of Regiments strove for was to have eight of the fourteen
regiments occupied on paying contracts at any one time while three recuperated
and trained and three handled Dirigent's planetary defense. The ideal was rarely
realized. At present not quite half of the Corps' men were on contract.
"Thank you, sir," Lon said.
"Administratively, you are assigned to the second squad of third platoon,"
Taiters said. He did not bother to add the rest: A Company, Second Battalion,
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Seventh Regiment, or—in the more common military shorthand—A-2-7. "That is
Corporal Girana's squad. You'd better haul your duffel up to the barracks, find
Girana, and get yourself squared away in a hurry, Cadet. You may have less than
five minutes before parade."
"Yes, sir." Lon stiffened to attention again, saluted, and left as soon as the
lieutenant returned the salute.
"Too damned young," Arlan muttered after he heard Lon Nolan's boots hurrying
along the corridor toward the stairs that led upstairs to third platoon's squad
bays. He
RICK SHELLEY
returned to the window and stared outside again. Too young, and too eager.
Taiters was a decade older than the cadet. He had been in the Seventh Regiment
of the Dirigent Mercenary Corps—DMC—for all of that decade and more. He was a
native Dirigenter. His father and both grandfathers—and most of the men in his
family for the past five generations—had been in the Corps, most of them in the
Seventh Regiment. There had never been any doubt that Arlan would enlist as soon
as he turned eighteen. It was in his blood, and in his upbringing. The
commission had been something of a surprise when it was offered.
The two-toned parade call sounded over speakers that ringed the drill field.
"Stand to for Regimental Honors Parade," came next. Arlan took a deep breath and
turned away from the window. He did not run for the hall door. Instead, he
walked, almost casually, to his room next door for a quick drink of water. Then
he got his fatigue cap and adjusted it carefully as he checked his appearance in
the mirror. By the time he got outside, most of the men of his two platoons were
already in place—or hurrying to get there—ready for the command to "Fall in."
It was an ancient ritual, centuries if not millennia old, differing only in
details from one army to the next, or from generation to generation. The
enlisted men hurried to their positions in ranks. The corporals and sergeants
made sure that their men were present and that the formation was acceptable. By
that time the platoon leaders and company commanders would be stepping into
position in front of their units, ready to receive the manning reports of their
subordinates, and then to do about-faces to report to their superiors. Arlan
could rarely escape recalling an observation that his father had made many years
before. "It's the military ballet, boy." Arlan had never seen ballet (nor had
his father—entertainments on Dirigent were rarely so lofty). But the phrase had
left an impression.
Taiters moved to his accustomed spot in front of the third and fourth platoons
of A-2-7. Sergeant Ivar Dendrow did
OFFICER-CADET
an about-face, saluted, and reported, "Third platoon all present, sir." Arlan
returned the salute. Sergeant Weil Jor gen snapped to and reported, "Fourth
platoon all present or accounted for, sir." Fourth had one man in hospital
Again, Arlan returned the salute and did his own about face. To his left,
Lieutenant Carl Hoper was reporting on the first and second platoons. As soon as
Hoper had finished, Taiters saluted and called out his own report:' 'Third and
fourth platoons all present or accounted for, sir." Captain Matt Orlis returned
Arlan's salute and turned to report to the battalion commander, who reported to
the regimental commander, who reported to the General—the head of the Council of
Regiments. Around the vast parade field, similar formations were being held by
each of the regiments that had men on base.
The Corps was put at parade rest. The troops had a ten-minute wait before the
buses carrying the returning soldiers came into view. The Corps was called to
attention again. While the buses drove across the center of the field, between
the ranks of the waiting regiments, the colors of each regiment were dipped in
salute, in turn. The officers held hand salutes. The men in ranks stood at rigid
attention.
The buses moved in their own formation. The lead vehicle was well ahead of the
others, strictly alone, traveling at seven miles per hour. Regimental colors
flew from either fender. Crossed white and black pennants were attached to
either side of the vehicle. Every man watching—save for those few who were too
new to the Corps to know what it signified—stared, sharing the same thought.
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This is how I'll come home for the last time if I'm killed in battle. The dead
of the DMC always came home first—if it was possible to bring them home at all.
Once the lead bus cleared the field, it sped away. The rest increased their pace
as they passed in review. After the last was gone, the regiments were dismissed.
The returning warriors had been properly honored for a victory—a fulfilled
contract.
"Hey, Nolan! Where do you think you're going?" Cor poral Tebba Girana shouted as
Lon started away from the dismissed honors formation.
"Back to the barracks, Corporal. I didn't have time to get all of my gear
squared away."
"Forget it for now. That'll wait. The mess hall is this way." Tebba pointed.
Girana was a little below average height for Dirigent (five feet, eleven inches
for men) but built stockily. Solidly muscled, he was a veteran of more than
fifteen years in the Corps. He pushed himself harder than he pushed any of his
men, and he kept himself as fit as he had been when he finished recruit training
when he was eighteen years old. There was no room in the DMC for flabby
soldiers—not even officers, let alone noncoms. If a man could no longer pass
muster, he was gone. Even the regimental commanders had to meet physical
training standards each year.
"I don't mind missing a meal, Corporal," Lon said. "I'm really not all that
hungry."
' 'Well, / mind. The lieutenant says I gotta get you up to speed in a hurry. We
might get a contract almost anytime. And missing meals when you don't have to is
a bad habit to get into. There'll be times enough in the field when rations are
short. Body's gotta have fuel to work right."
Nolan had been under military discipline too long, on Earth and Dirigent, to
argue any longer. He nodded and walked with Girana toward the mess hall.
Automatically,
RICK SHELLEY
Lon fell in step with the corporal. After more than three years at The Springs,
the military academy of the North American Union, and two months of recruit
training on Dirigent, Lon could scarcely walk anywhere with anyone without
subconsciously walking in step.
More than three years, almost four, Lon thought. It was still hard to accept the
sudden and unexpected change in his life. He had been less than eight months
from graduation at The Springs, and his commission in the NAU Army. Ranked third
in his class at the beginning of his senior year and with a spotless
disciplinary record, he had looked forward to rapid promotion and a good career.
And then the bottom had fallen out.
"It's a good life here, most of the time," Girana said, and Lon realized that he
had missed whatever the corporal had said before that. "An honorable life for a
man."
"I never wanted to be anything but a soldier," Lon said, hoping that it would
sound as if he had been following what Girana had been saying. / never wanted to
be anything but a soldier. That was the problem. That was why the bottom had
felt as if it had been yanked out from under him at The Springs.
"I don't imagine you'd have faced the sort of operations we do," Girana said.
"Earth is so damned crowded. I doubt that the total population of all the worlds
I've been on add up to a third of the people who live on Earth. Of course, I've
only been on a small fraction of the worlds that people live on."
"Does anyone even know how many planets have been settled?" Lon asked. "Back
home—back on Earth, I mean—there'd be a different number anywhere you looked."
Girana grinned. "I'd guess that Corps Intelligence has a pretty good count on
the number of worlds. That's their pidgin, after all. You never know where you
might find a contract. There must be more than a thousand settled
OFFICER-CADET
worlds. Maybe half as many space habitats. Now, those are hairy for a foot
soldier."
"I can imagine," Lon said. It was something he had never considered. He started
to think about the possibilities, but Girana kept talking.
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"Like fighting with your hands tied behind your back. You can't use half your
weapons because you might breach hull integrity. Zero gravity—or, at best,
partial gravity from spin—I don't think any of the deepers bother with any thing
near full gravity. Sure not on the few habitats I've been to."
' 'I think Over-Galapagos keeps its outer levels at seventy percent, but I know
what you mean," Lon said. "I guess if they wanted full gravity, they'd have
stayed on the dirt, like us."
"Yeah, something like that," Girana agreed. "They're a weird lot, the deepers,
the few I've come across."
' 'I spent eleven days at Over-Galapagos on the way here That was the first
permanent deeper structure over Earth, out at geo-stationary. Something like
twenty-five thousand people live there permanently, and there are always a few
hundred temporaries—or so I was told. I had to wait to change transport coming
here. Eat, sleep, and exercise so your bones don't soften up, and all the other
stuff. Most of the folks don't live out where they'd have seventy percent
gravity. There's not much time for anything else. I don't know how they get
anything done."
"They don't, not much," Girana said with the unques tioning confidence of a man
who knew almost nothing about it. ' 'The deepers are a dead end. Freaks. Another
fifty years, most of those habs will be deserted. It's just not natural for
people to live out in space like that."
Maybe, but I doubt it, Lon thought. He would not openly disagree with the
corporal, not within thirty minutes after joining his squad. There were millions
of people living in space habitats. Some of the habs had been in constant use
RICK SHELLEY
for nearly five centuries. It was hard to write their inhabitants off as freaks
on a dead end.
The first and second battalions of Seventh Regiment shared a mess hall, but each
company had its own dining room. They were on two floors, ranged around the
central core that allowed Food Services access to each of them. Girana led Lon
up to the second floor and through a door marked A-2-7.
"We eat good in garrison," Girana said as they moved toward the cafeteria-style
serving line. "Civilian cooks, good chow, and plenty of it. It makes up for the
lean times."
"You talk like nobody ever eats on a campaign," Lon said.
"Contract, not campaign," Tebba corrected absently. "Naw, it's not that so much.
Just, well, sometimes it's hard to get your fill in the field. Battle rations
may provide all the stuff that a body needs, but it don't always fill you up
right. And there's times when even the BR packets don't get around on time."
The serving trays were large, and Girana took liberal portions of just about
everything as he moved along the line—and the available choices were quite
broad. Nolan took less, but more than he had expected. The aromas were enticing
enough to waken his appetite. I guess I'm hungrier than I thought, he decided
with a thin smile. The drinks carousel had everything but alcoholic beverages.
Nearly half of the men in the company had reached the dining hall ahead of
Girana and Nolan. There was already considerable noise—people talking as they
settled in at their places and started to eat. But the noise never became
overwhelming. Acoustical ceiling panels kept the sound level bearable. The
dining halls at The Springs had never been so relaxed. There, it was all sit at
attention on the edge of your seat. Don't speak unless you're spoken to by a
superior, and then keep your response down to the fewest
OFFICER-CADET
syllables possible—"Yes, sir," and "No, sir," were preferred. Eat by the
numbers. Finish and get out. The mess hall of the training battalion on Dirigent
had been less formal, but the training had been so long and arduous that few of
the recruits had retained energy for talk when they came in from the field at
the end of each day. There had been times when just staying awake through the
meal had been an almost insurmountable challenge.
/ like this place, Lon told himself before he got to the table or took his first
bite of supper. The colors were warm, the atmosphere friendly. Between the
serving line and the table, Girana stopped a half dozen times to return
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greetings or to say something to someone at one of the other tables. Lon found
himself more relaxed than he had been in ages. It felt good.
The men of second squad had reached their table more or less together. Including
Girana, there were eleven regular members of the squad. They were one man short
of full manning. Until Lon received his commission, he would make up the
difference. Girana seated the cadet next to him at one end of the long table and
introduced the new man to the rest of the squad. Lon concentrated on the names
and the faces that went with them. Remembering names had never come easily for
him. These were men he would go into combat with, at least once. And, unless
things went terribly wrong, Lon might command these same men someday. He had to
know them.
Janno Belzer had curly black hair and eyes, and an olive complexion. He was tall
and thin. Dean Bricks was blond, with light brown eyes and the sort of pallor
common to people who never got out in the sun. He seemed to be almost exactly
Lon's size and build. Phip Steesen was shorter, with a receding hairline; the
hair, what was left, was an indeterminate brown. Gen Radnor was big and beefy,
dark hair, bushy eyebrows, and sunken dark eyes. He seemed to be the most
reticent of the men in the squad. Lance Corporal Dav Grott was the assistant
squad leader.
RICK SHELLEY
He looked older than his thirty-two years, as if he had lived a particularly
hard life. Frank Raiz was the youngest member of the squad—excluding Lon—at
twenty-three. He kept his scalp shaved. It gave him a fierce look. Raphael
Macken was the kind of man who could escape notice in a group of three. Tod
Schpelt was distinguished by an accent different from the rest, despite the fact
that his family had been on Dirigent for three generations—still newcomers.
Harvey Fehr concentrated on his eating. Lon did not hear him speak at all during
that meal. Bait Hoper was a distant cousin of Lieutenant Carl Hoper, platoon
leader for the company's first and second platoons.
The first real question, after all of the greetings and exchanges of names, was,
"Where are you from?" Lon's accent did place him as an off-worlder.
"Earth," Lon said, without really thinking about it. He was cutting into his
roast. The sudden silence that greeted his announcement made him look up. He
scanned the faces that were staring at him—everyone but Girana and Fehr.
"Did I say something wrong?" Lon asked.
A couple of heads shook. A couple of mumbled negatives were voiced. "You caught
us off guard," Janno Bel-zer said. "I don't think I've ever met anyone who came
right from Earth."
"You pulled a fast one on us, Tebba," Dean Bricks accused, pointing his fork at
the corporal. "You shoulda warned us."
Girana grinned. "What, and spoil the fun? And you can bet you've met guys from
Earth before. There must be sixty or seventy in the Corps, maybe more. There's
always some."
"Hey, a couple of million people a year go outsystem from Earth. They've got to
be around somewhere," Lon said.
"Maybe they lie about where they're from," Phip Stee-sen suggested. That drew a
laugh from most of his squad-mates.
OFFICER-CADET
"Could be," Lon said, falling into the bantering spirit more easily than he
would have guessed possible. "They probably don't want to hurt any colonials'
feelings."
"I hear they's so many folks on Earth now that they gotta sleep in shifts, that
there ain't enough room for them all to lay down at once," Dean said.
"Naw, the problem is they spend so much time in the sack that they make more
people than they know what to do with," Phip said before Lon could respond.
Supper went on at length. Now and then someone would get up to go back through
the serving line. Someone else would make a ran to the drinks carousel with a
tray to bring back refills for anyone who wanted them. Lon continued to do more
listening than talking, but he did answer questions when they came his way.
Janno, Dean, and Phip did most of the talking for the veterans in the squad.
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Lon's longest contribution came when one of them asked why he had come to
Dirigent.
"Now, that's the kind of question you don't have to answer, Nolan," Girana said,
scowling down the table at the person who had asked it. "Every man's past is his
own."
"I don't mind." Lon shrugged. "It's probably better that I do talk about it. I
haven't had much chance. Sometimes I'm not sure that I really… comprehend
everything about it." After that, he had the full attention of everyone at the
table. Even Fehr looked up from his eating.
"Since I was little, I never wanted to be anything other than a soldier," Lon
said. "Now, it was never just a kid thing with toy soldiers and playing war.
Even when I was only, oh, six or seven, that's what I wanted to be. The older I
got, the more set I was. I wanted to be a soldier. When I was in my junior year
of high school, I took the preliminaries for competitive appointment to The
Springs—the North American Military Academy—passed, and went on to the second
round of testing." He paused long enough to
RICK SHELLEY
take a last bite of his dessert and to wash it down with a long sip of coffee.
"I won the appointment, went to The Springs, and did fairly well. By the start
of my final year, I was… near enough the top to look forward to a good career in
the NAU Army." There was no point in bragging that he had been ranked third.
"Then the commandant called me into his office." Lon paused for a long time
then, but no one said anything. He was remembering that morning when his
carefully planned future had been taken away from him. In his mind, he relived
the interview with the commandant, hardly aware that he was describing the
events to his new squad-mates at the same time.
"Cadet Nolan reporting as ordered, sir." Lon had been nervous about the summons
to the commandant's office, but he could not think of anything he might have
done that would call for disciplinary action, even though he did not know of
anyone who had ever been called in for anything else. In the few minutes he had
been given to prepare himself, Lon had thought back over everything he had done
recently, and he could conceive of no reason why he might be called to account.
Commandant Banks returned Nolan's salute. "Sit down," he said, gesturing to a
chair near the corner of his desk. That invitation was more of a shock to Lon
than the summons had been. He sat on the edge of the seat, at attention, the way
he had always been forced to sit as a plebe. The commandant swiveled his own
chair until he was facing Lon.
"Relax. You're not on the carpet," Banks said, correctly gauging Lon's worries.
"Far from it. You have one of the . most nearly spotless records I've seen in my
years at The Springs. In a way, that makes what I have to say even more
difficult."
"Sir?"
"I have received a directive from the Secretary of De-
OFFICER-CADET 17
fense," Banks said. "The curriculum for the spring semester will be drastically
changed for this year's first classmen, concentrating on riot control and
criminal justice topics. And the top one hundred and fifty members of your
graduating class will be transferred to the Department of Justice for
commissioning in the NAU Federal Police. No exceptions will be permitted."
Lon did not realize that he had fallen silent, lost in his memories, until Phip
asked, "So what'd you do, resign?" Slowly, Lon shook his head as he looked
around the table at his new comrades. "I couldn't. I didn't have acceptable
grounds. And, in the time I had left, I couldn't lower my grade average enough
to get below the top one hundred and fifty unless I simply stopped doing my
class-work and intentionally failed tests, and that would have opened me up to
disciplinary action for willful misconduct. When the commandant hit me with the
news about being sent to be a federal cop… well, I really can't describe all of
the things that went through my head, all at once, mixed together in a crazy
jumble. The only way out that I could see was to do something really
desperate—and incredibly stupid. But the commandant was a couple of steps ahead
of me."
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"He sprung you?" Janno asked.
"In a way," Lon said, nodding. "He took a big risk."
"Look at me, Nolan." Lon had blinked and looked up. He had not even noticed that
he had let his gaze, his head, drop. The news was simply too devastating to be
true.
"Yes, sir."
"I've got a good notion how this hits you. It sticks in my craw as well. We're
soldiers, though, you and I, and soldiers take orders, even when they don't like
them." A grim smile fixed itself on the commandant's face. "My job here has been
to turn out soldiers, not combat-ready po-
RICK SHELLEY
lice." He glanced toward the office door, then leaned closer to Lon.
"What I have to say to you isn't to go any farther. You're not to repeat it
outside of this room. Is that understood?"
"Yes, sir." Lon felt puzzlement return, but all he could do was sit and wait for
the commandant to continue.
"As I said, I've got a damn good idea how this hits you. I've been stewing over
this directive since I received it four days ago and found that there is no give
to it. Now, there is absolutely no way that I can get you a commission in the
NAU Army, or in any other army… on this planet." When Banks paused, Nolan raised
his head a little more.
"You do want to be a soldier, rather than a cop, don't you?''
"Yes, sir. I've never wanted to be anything else."
"That's what I thought. Now, I'm going to give you a name and a complink code.
Memorize them. Don't write them down. Things may get rough for you here for a
while, Nolan, but stick it out. Then, when the time comes—and you'll know when
that is—give that code a call and take it from there."
Lon blinked again, several times, and looked around at his new squadmates. "The
complink number was for a DMC recruiter who was operating, illegally, on Earth."
"Yeah, but what happened?" Phip asked.
Lon grinned, but there was pain behind it. "Thirty-two of the top one hundred
and fifty members of my class were dismissed from the academy for 'conduct
unbecoming.' The commandant rigged a shakedown inspection and we were all caught
with contraband. He gave us all the maxi-" mum penalty permitted—expulsion from
the academy with prejudice—and then he resigned his own commission the same day.
And here I am."
"Here you are," Corporal Girana said. "And it's time
OFFICER-CADET
to get back to the barracks, Nolan. We've got to draw your equipment and start
checking you out on everything. You go right into training with the platoon,
first thing tomorrow morning, so we've got to get you ready tonight."
"I wish I could tell you that we have up-to-date files on every planet where we
might be called upon to fight," Lieutenant Taiters told Lon. "But I can't. Corps
Intelligence does what it can, but there are simply too many worlds, and
conditions change too rapidly. We can hardly hope to know the names of all of
the worlds that have been settled, and any information we might have on
planetary affairs or population data could be hopelessly obsolete when we need
it. There are times when all we have is what the contract officer can glean from
the client, and that isn't always, shall we say, completely accurate."
Alpha Company had been split up for the day, with the men assigned to work
details around base—one of the routine hazards of garrison duty. Lon was exempt
from fatigue duty, but that did not give him time off. There were always lessons
to be learned, equipment and procedures to be mastered. Usually Arlan Taiters
was his tutor, but occasionally Captain Orlis, the company commander, took over.
This particular afternoon, nearly a month after Nolan's assignment to A-2-7, Lon
and the lieutenant were in one of the offices at regimental headquarters, using
a desktop comp-link with a large monitor screen.
"The files are kept updated, as possible," Taiters said. He had already shown
Nolan how to log on and get through the indexing system of the database.
"Geographical features are least likely to change—over the time scales we're
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concerned with. Once we have reliable physical survey data
RICK SHELLEY
on a planet, we can count on knowing something about the terrain and climate if
we have to go in. But that's about it. The social and political data change too
quickly. The smaller the population, the faster it tends to change. And even
though most colonies tend to go through the same basic stages, there are
exceptions, and even when there aren't radical departures, colonies take
different amounts of time to pass from stage to stage."
"Are you saying that this is all wasted effort?" Lon asked.
Arlan shook his head. "No, of course not. The point is that you can never take
it for granted that anything in the files will be accurate when we get to a
world on contract. There are serious limits. We gather all of the information we
can get, and put a lot of effort into analyzing it. And when someone approaches
the Council of Regiments about hiring troops, we can usually get considerable
information about the zone of operations. But that is not always accurate
information. There are times when the people who hire us prefer that we not know
certain facts that might affect whether or not we accept a contract, or
information we might find, ah, too useful. The database is a useful tool, but it
can never be the only tool."
"Do we run our own surveys first, before committing troops?''
"When possible. Too often there are time pressures that preclude it." Arlan
logged out of the database. "Enough of this for one day. It's starting to fog my
brain." He got up from the desk. Lon stood just as quickly. "Let's go burn some
calories."
"Yes, sir." There were times when Lon would have preferred accompanying the
other men of his squad on their work details. Sweating at physical labor was a
relief from skull sweating.
There was a large, fully equipped gymnasium in the basement of regimental
headquarters. There was also a swim-
OFFICER-CADET
ming pool in an adjacent room. The facility was maintained for officers and
noncoms who escaped some of the physical exertions of their charges. Lon had
even seen Colonel Gaff-ney, the regimental commander, sweating away at the
machines. And, since Lon was exempt from work details, he was
allowed—encouraged—to use the gym as often as he wanted to as well.
"How much time do we have?" Lon asked the lieutenant as they changed to shorts
and sneakers in the locker room.
"You have all the time you want. Just leave yourself time to get cleaned up
before supper," Arlan said. "I'll have to leave at 1600, though. Battalion staff
meeting."
They split up when they entered the gym. Taiters headed directly for the
punching bags. At one time he had been Corps champion for his weight division.
Lon started out with a few stretching exercises to loosen up and then started
running the track that marked the perimeter of the gym. Lon had been a distance
runner in high school and at The Springs. He had won a good share of the races
he had entered, and had rarely placed farther back than third—but he had never
quite managed to reach record time, no matter how hard he pushed himself.
He still pushed himself, but his times had started to decline. While the records
back on Earth were improving, he was getting worse, lagging farther behind, if
not by much. But he did not give up. He would not.
One really good run, he told himself as he started the stopwatch on his wrist.
It doesn't matter if anyone else knows. I just need one really good run to
satisfy myself. Although there were a dozen others using the gym, Lon had the
track to himself. When other exercisers came into or left the gym, they waited
to cross the track until he was clear. A runner always had the right-of-way. Lon
stretched into his best form, breathing deeply and focusing as far out in front
as he could, concentrating, narrowing his universe. The run was all there was,
the only thing that mattered. It was a short track. Seven laps equaled one mile.
Distances
RICK SHELLEY
were marked along the wall and on the floor. Lon kept the count of laps without
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conscious thought.
He looked at his watch just as he crossed the mile marker—before he started to
slow down. "Damn," he muttered. He had not even broken four minutes. Way too
slow. He put his hands on his hips as he slowed to a trot for a final half lap.
He put in five minutes on the rings to exercise his arms and upper body, then
moved to a machine that allowed him to alternate weight work with his arms and
legs. By the time he got up from that apparatus, his arms and legs were
trembling. He was covered in sweat, and about ready to collapse for a long rest.
But he did not stop. He forced himself through several minutes of light work to
cool off, then headed for the swimming pool. Stopping just long enough to strip
off his shoes and socks, he dove into the pool, welcoming the shock of cool
water. He took fifteen minutes for ten laps of the pool, resting for a few
seconds after each lap, not pushing himself to his limits in the water. Then he
flipped over onto his back and floated for a few minutes, kicking gently through
wide circles around the center of the pool. He stayed in the water until he felt
as if he were nearly relaxed enough to fall asleep where he was. Then he paddled
lazily to the edge and got out. He glanced at his watch. It was nearly 1630
hours.
"Still plenty of time before supper," Lon muttered. Everyone seemed to be overly
anxious that he not miss meals, and that puzzled him. He was not underweight,
and certainly not malnourished or anemic. He took a towel from a rack, dried
off, then picked up his shoes and socks and headed for the locker room. He took
a shower, first so hot that it turned his skin pink, then icy cold, raising
gooseflesh. By the time he was ready to leave the gymnasium, it was time to head
for the mess hall.
Dirigent City was adjacent to the main base of the DMC. The city and the base
had grown together over the past five
OFFICER-CADET
centuries. For most of that time the commander of the Dirigent Mercenary Corps,
the General (there was only one general at a time in the DMC, the head of the
Council of Regiments, elected by that council from its own members), had also
been—ex officio—head of the planetary government. Together, the base and the
city accounted for two thirds of the world's population. Most of the rest could
be found within a two-hundred-mile radius. That was an unusual concentration for
a world that had been settled as long as Dirigent—more than six centuries—but
Dirigent was an unusual world, still almost entirely dependent on a single
industry. Most colony worlds became more diversified within three or four
generations of their founding.
Although Dirigent City was, overwhelmingly, an army town, there was one
important distinction from army towns on other worlds. The civilian area
immediately bordering the main gate was not given over to businesses designed to
service soldiers and separate them from their pay. The blocks nearest the main
gate, and along the route between it and the spaceport across town, were
maintained to impress off-world visitors—especially potential clients.
Government agencies and offices for civilian professionals were concentrated
along the route that diplomats were most likely to travel. There were also
factories visible from that route—at a distance, mostly, away from densely
populated neighborhoods—factories that produced the weapons of war, and the
supplies that soldiers needed. Dirigent exported munitions as well as men.
The off-duty haunts of the soldiers were hidden behind the public facade, on
side streets and in neighborhoods away from the showy face of the city. The
nearest were close enough for a thirsty soldier to reach without too great an
effort, but the fancier watering holes were farther off, along with the other
establishments that dedicated themselves to the wants and needs of the
soldiers—particularly the unmarried soldiers, who comprised more than 60 percent
of the DMC. There were always taxis available near
RICK SHELLEY
the gates of "The Base" to take soldiers where they wanted to go, and two bus
routes had stops across the street from the main gate… for the budget-conscious.
After a quick supper, Lon Nolan left base, alone. Most of the squad had headed
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